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Robert Goodloe Harper 



BY 



C. W. SOMMBRVILLE, A. M. 



Me 



A Dissertation presented to the Board of University Studies 

of the Johns Hopkins University for the 

Deg-ree of Doctor of Philosophy. 



THE NEALE COMPANY 

431 ELEVENTH STREET N. W. 

WASHINGTON, D, C, 

1899 



Robert Goodloe Harper 



BY 



C. W. SOMMERVILIvK, A. M. 



A Dissertation presented to the Board of University Studies 

of the Johns Hopkins University for the 

Deg-ree of Doctor of Philosophy. 



THE NEAL.E COMPANY 

4S1 ELEVENTH STREET N. W. 

V/ASHINGTON, D. C. 

1899 







44173 



TO MY SISXERS 




Of those distinguished men who graced the Maryland bar In 
the early part of this century, General Robert Goodloe Harper 
ranked among the first. It is the aim of this paper to set forth the 
main facts in his life in its public and national relations. Materials 
for this puiiDose were abundant, but scattered. They included a brief 
manuscript account of his life written by General Harper about 
ISOl; files of letters and documents, to which access was given by 
Mr. W. C. Pennington, of Baltimore;"^ two volumes of Harper's 
Works (Baltimore, 1814), and sundry pamphlets published by him. 
Further information was gathered from newspapers, journals, 
biographies and reports. 

My thanks for suggestions are due to Professor Adams, to Drs, 
Steiner, Vincent, Ballagh and Willoughby. 

Baltimore, June^ 1S99. 



ROBERT GOODLOE HARPER, 

By C. W. Sommerville. 

EGBERT GOODLOE HARPER was born on a Virginia 
farm near Fredericksburg, in January, 1765. His 
father, Jesse Harper, and his grandfather, Abraham Harper, 
had lived for years in Spottsylvania County, Va. The family 
is traced far back in English history. In Virginia its mem- 
bers had intermarried with the Min(ws and the Groodloes. 

Robert Goodloe Harper was the only boy in a family of 
nine. When he was about four years old his father moved 
into Northern North Carolina, and there the family has re- 
mained. Harper was taught at home until about his tenth 
year, when he was sent to the grammar school. 

When the Bristish Army, under Lord Cornwallis, having 
defeated General Gates near Camden, overran North Caro- 
lina, Harper, though but a lad of fifteen, left his books and 
joined a volunteer corps of cavalry, which served under 
General Nathaniel Greene, until the British left the State 
for Yorktown. 

Harper now tried to study again, but he found books too 
dull after an experience in the field of arms, and after the 
promotion his efforts had gained. He had been made Quar- 
termaster to his corps.* His efforts at study were made 
the harder by a tempting offer of a lieutenancy in a regular 
cavalry regiment. His father dissuaded him from accept- 
ing the lieutenancy, and Harper agreed to continue his stud- 
ies until he was twenty years old, on his father's promise 
then to equip him for military service. 

Peace with England soon relieved the father of his part 
of the agreement, and a surveying tour in 1783 in "the Ken- 
tucky and Tennessee countries" took Harper away from 
books again. This visit to the West gave Harper a knowl- 
edge of that great territory and also a turn for land specula- 

*R. Walsh, Jr., in "Encyclopedia Americana." Walsh had read law 
In Harper's ofBce. 

The facts in this chapter are found In unpublished manuscripts, 
to which I have had access through the courtesy of Mr. W. C. Pen- 
nington, of Baltimore. 



6 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

tion; facts which influenced his future to some degree. He 
acquired at this time some of the western lands, but from 
surveyors' frauds and his own neglect little profit came of 
them. 

For some time after his return from the West, Harper 
indulged in idleness, dissipation and gambling. Finally he 
accepted his father's offer to send him to college, and in 
June, 1784, he set out for Princeton College, N. J. When 
his slender means were exhausted, he applied to President 
John Witherspoon for employment in a grammar school 
which the President had established in the college. Kev. 
Dr. Samuel Stanhope Smith also engaged him to teach some 
boys who had been put in Dr. Smith's care. This work in 
teaching consumed eight hours a day, so that when college 
duties were done there was little time left for rest or exer- 
cise. In the spring vacation of 1785 Harper went to New 
York and had an interview with Governor Spaight, of 
North Carolina, who loaned the student means for the next 
session at college. Harper carried the junior and senior 
classes together the next term, and on September 28, 1785, 
he was graduated Bachelor of Arts, received the Essayist's 
Medal, and delivered a discourse on "The Proper Objects of 
Education."* 

When Harper left college it was his desire to see the 
world. He went with a fellow student to Philadelphia and 
determined to sail for England and make the tour of Europe 
on foot. He planned to give lessons in London and to use 
his knowledge of tools, if need be, at the joiner's trade, until 
his means were better. But ice in the Delaware delayed 
shipping for weeks.f 

This delay was fatal to Harper's plan, and he determined 
to go to Charleston, S. C, and teach and study law. 

As Harper stood a penniless stranger on the Charleston 
wharf in November, 1785, he was accosted by the father of 
one of his former pupils at Princeton, and received great 
kindness and help from him. In Charleston he engaged as 
usher in a large school kept by Mr. Thompson. He thus 
made forty guineas a year and at the same time studied law 
in the office of two young Parkers, who were then making a 
reputation at the bar. Colonel Hawkins, of North Carolina, 
was in Charleston during the winter, and having known 
the Harpers, introduced Robert Goodloe Harper to General 

*New Jersey Gazette, October 10, 1780, quoted by Moore in taia 
"American Eloquence," page 489. 
tRobert Walsh, Jr., in "Encyclopedia Americana." 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 7 

Pinckney, Mr. Edward Rutledge and other persons of promi- 
nence. In the fall of 1786, Harper was admitted to the bar. 
He soon located in Ninety-six District, in the upper part of 
South Carolina. Here he gained some political notice by a 
series of articles on a proposed change in the State Consti- 
tution.* 

In the latter part of 1789, Harper removed to Charleston, 
where he engaged in a growing practice, and was soon in 
the State Legislature. 

In 1791 he renewed his connection with land speculation, 
then rife. A company which had contracted with the State 
of Georgiaf for a large territory on the Mississippi engaged 
him as their manager, offering him five per cent, of the pur- 
chase for his services. He went that summer to Philadel- 
phia to sell the stock of this land company. 

The land scheme miscarried, but Harper's mind had been 
diverted from his profession, and his trip had created a de- 
cided relish for the Northern States, and had aroused ambi- 
tions towards a Congressional career. 

A seat was offered Harper in 1792, but he declined be- 
cause of the small pay of six dollars per diem allowed Rep- 
resentatives. Meanwhile land speculation was profitable 
and very attractive. 

In 1794 he bought a plantation in Ninety-six, intending to 
remove there from Charleston. He then offered himself a 
candidate for the House of Representatives and was elected 
for Ninety-six District, meanwhile continuing in the Legisla- 
ture of the State until the time for him to take his seat in 
Congress, December, 1795. Before this time arrived the 
death of Alexander Gillon caused a vacancy in the Orange- 
burg District. Harper was pressed to stand as a candidate 
for Orangeburg. He was elected as a Democrat, and took 
his seat on Monday, February 9, 1795. J 

In the importance of events and discussions, excitements 
of parties and the talents of leaders, that period may be 
termed one of the most remarkable in our annals as a na- 
tion. Harper was to take his place among the leaders of the 
dominant party. Madison wrote to Jefferson on learning 
of Harper's first election (November 16, 1794): "Hunter's 
successor (a Mr. Harper) will be a valuable acquisition, be- 
ing able, sound and eloquent."§ 

♦Harper's Works, 1: 42. 

tout of this grew the famous Yazoo frauds so long fought by John 
Randolph, of Roanoke. 
JAnnals of Congress, 1793-'5, page 1205. 
§Madisou's Works 2: 20. 



8 Robert Ooodloe Harper. 

On Monday, February 9, 1790, Harper took his seat in 
Congress as a Representative of South Carolina,* and on the 
17th he was assigned to his first committee.f We shall 
find him advocating measures of relief, internal improve- 
ments and of general welfare. His view extended to the 
whole country. In 1791 a survey of the coast of Georgia 
had been begun by private persons. Harper saw the utility 
of such a survey to shipping, and at once advocated a loan 
by the United States for completing such a work, because 
it was for the national benefit.J He rose above narrow 
state lines before harbor improvements or coast survey by 
the National Government had been thought of. 

His experience with land speculations enabled him to give 
a complete historical argument vindicating the right of 
Georgia in the famous Yazoo land frauds,§ and in case of 
the Northwest Territory he opposed the sale of lands in 
large tracts to speculators. He was unsuccessful in his op- 
position, but he was on the side of wisdom, for he advocated 
the sale of lands in small lots to actual settlers. This would 
shut out speculators, give the Government a better price for 
them, and insure permanent and desirable settlers. || 

Harper's entrance into Congress was in the midst of the 
negotiations with England regarding the differences left 
unsettled since the treaty of Paris, 1783. Jay's treaty was 
signed November 19, 1794, but it did not reach Washington 
until March 7, 1795. When its provisions were known op- 
position to it swept the country with the violence of a hurri- 
cane.^ Jefferson called it infamous; Jay was burned in 
effigy. As an appropriation was necessary to carry the 
treaty into effect, it had to come before the House. This 
brought out notable speeches.** Washington refused to send 
the papers asked for, because the treaty-making power, he 
said, laid with the Executive with the Senate's consent. Tor- 
rents of abuse fell on Washington. There was talk of im- 
peachment. Speeches were fiery. "Never," said Marshall, 
"had a greater display been made of argument, of eloquence 
and of passion." One of the greatest speeches was by Fisher 
Ames. Gallatin assertedff that a treaty is not valid until it 

•Annals 1793-5, 1205. 

tAnnals, 1230. 

JAnnals, 1793-5; p. 1249. and for 1795-6, pp. 149-158. 

§Annals, 1795-G, p. 1279. 

II Annals, 1795-6; p. 353. 

ilWhitelock, Life and Times of John Jay, p. 278. 

**Annals, 1795-6; pp. 457, 747, 801, 886, 810, 955, 1171. 

tfAnnals, p. 747. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 9 

has received the sanction of the House. Harper replied that 
in limited governments the treaty-making power may be 
limited. The treaty-making power had been given to the 
President and Senate, as legislative power to the House. A 
treaty is not a law and does not belong to the House, A 
treaty derives its origin from the consent of equals, while a 
law gets its from the authority of a superior. Laws are com- 
mands; treaties are compacts. 

Treaties, he argued, lie in the province of the law of na- 
tions; the legislative power has to do with municipal law. 
The Legislature cannot make a compact, nor can the treaty- 
making power make a law. The House had nothing to do 
with treaties except to determine how far they could carry 
them out. Harper supported his views by citations from 
English and international usage. With as forcible argu- 
ments he maintained against Gallatin that treaties repeal 
all existing opposing laws.* 

In defense of Jay's treaty Harper argued that the whole 
commercial part of it was to expire at the end of twelve 
years and might be terminated by the United States at the 
end of two years from the close of the war between England 
and France. Hard as the stipulations might be, they could 
not ruin trade in so short a while. We charged England with 
having failed to give up the western posts, as she had agreed 
to do in the treaty of Paris; with having carried away, con- 
trary to that treaty, a number of slaves, when New York 
was evacuated, and with violating the law of nations by the 
capture of American vessels which were neutral in regard to 
England and France. But England claimed to hold the posts 
as a pledge for our payment of British debts; that the ne- 
groes carried away were not American property at this time, 
and that no American vessel had been taken against the 
law of nations. Now, said Harper, under these circum- 
stances, there were but three courses to follow: Submit 
quietly; compel redress; negotiate redress. The first course 
would be dastardly. The second course might take the di- 
rection of war, commercial restriction, prohibition of inter- 
course, or sequestration of debts. As to war, we had not a 
frigate nor a regiment to spare from the Indian wars, com- 
mercial restriction would probably widen the breach,! and 
we would lose more than we gained. To suspend commercial 
intercourse would hurt us and do no good; and, finally, se- 

* Annals. 1795-6; p. 758. 
t Works 1: 12. 



10 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

questration of British debts would shake foreign confidence 
in us, ruin our credit and at the last compel us to fight or to 
negotiate under less favorable circumstances. The third 
course, negotiation, was then the only possible course left 
us. More than this, he said, things were not as bad as they 
appeared to be. The negroes carried off numbered only 
about three throusand, and a third of these were free. The 
two thousand slaves at two hundred dollars each would 
make a sum far less than the cost of a quarrel; a three 
months' war would cost five times as much. The impress- 
ment of seamen was really provided against in the nine- 
teenth article of the treaty.* Then the Western posts were 
to be held only for eighteen months longer. These draw- 
backs could be endured for a while rather than to suffer all 
the horrors of war. 

Moreover, the treaty settled our differences, gave us ad- 
vantages in the East Indies and Canadian trade, and was a 
basis for a future and more beneficial arrangement. 

In spite of many such arguments the appropriation bill 
necessary to render the treaty effective only passed by a 
vote of 51 to 48. All the New England members but four, 
most of those from the Middle States, but only four from the 
South, voted for the bill. Harper was serving his first term, 
and was placing his future political advancement in jeop- 
ardy by opposing the popular will, almost unanimous in 
the South, which had wrought itself up to the pitch of ston- 
ing Hamilton for attempting to defend the treaty. f But 
Harper was too brave to go against his convictions. He de- 
fended the treaty and published his arguments for it. His 
straightforward course insured his re-election until the 
downfall of the Federalists. 

In the Fifth and Sixth Congresses, Harper was the Fed- 
eralist leader.t He was made Chairman of the Committee on 
Ways and Means December 4, 1797,§ and was again ap- 
pointed December 9, 1799, for the last session he served. In 
this position he had charge of all the financial schemes of 
the Administration at the critical period of the threatened 
war w'ith France. 

In 1797, Harper published his "Observations on the Dis- 
pute Between the United States and France," in which he 
presented a very strong case against France. The publica- 

• Works 1: 18. 

tMacMaster, United States, 2: 219. 

:|:Schouler, Hist, of the U. S., 1: 352. 

§Annals of Congress, 1797, p. 672, and 1799, p. 197. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 11 

tion brought him much notice. Peter Porcapine,* in a tirade 
against Harper, says that "the pamphlet which gained him 
so much renown in England, and which was quoted wirh 
high enconiums in both Houses of Parliament, I furnished 
the hints, gave the materials, drew the plan for; and while 
Lord Grenville was extolling this pamphlet in one House 
and Mr. Dundas in the other, while they were paying such a 
handsome tribute to the talents, candor and integrity of the 
honorable member of the American Congress, after the Eng- 
lish applause had been echoed and re-echoed through 
America, Harper published a new edition. The pamphlet 
did great good in both countries and great injury to France." 
G. Cabot wrote, April 25, 1798, to John Adams :t "We keep 
our presses going with Harper's excellent speech and 
pamphlet. Harper must devote himself to proving to the 
people the absolute propriety of what is done. If he knew 
the extent of his fame already acquired, his ambition would 
stimulate him to the most laborious undertakings;" also,t 
quoting a letter from William Smith, Minister to Portugal, 
August 14, 1798, "Harper's pamphlet has been translated 
into Portuguese and distributed here gratis. It was printed 
by order of the Government." Fisher Ames wrote to Chris. 
Gore in London, July 28, 1798 :§ "Did Lord Grenville and 
Dundas know that their eulogium on his book would help 
the French by marring a good thing in Congress? Yet, so 
it is. Harper is a fine fellow, but praise has half spoiled 
him." 

The impeachment of Blount occupied a part of this session 
of Congress, and Harper took a leading part in the case. 
An account of it is given below. 

The protective measures of proposed restriction in natural- 
ization, the Alien Act, Alien Enemies Act and the Sedition 
Act were all championed by Harper. In advocating the 
limitation of naturalization facilities, he said|j it was time 
we should recover from the mistake of admitting foreigners 
to citizenship. This mistake had been productive of very 
great evils to the country, and there was danger of those 
evils increasing. The time had come when it was proper to 
declare that nothing but birth should entitle a man to citi- 
zenship in this country. He was for giving foreigners every 
facility for acquiring and holding property and of transfer- 

*Porcupine's Works. 9; 331. 

tLife and Works of Fisher Ames, 1: 236. 

J2, 119. 

§Ibi(i, 1: 236. 

llAnnals, 1798; p. 1567. 



13 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

ring it to their families, but they should not be given the 
right of citizenship, because they could not have the same 
views as native citizens. It was an underlying principle of 
civil society that none but persons born in a country should 
be permitted to take part in the government. The bill favor- 
ing a more restricted naturalization became law June 18.* 

One of Harper's last speeches in Congressf was in advo- 
cacy of continuing the Sedition Act, which he regarded "as 
a shield for the liberty of the press and the freedom of opin- 
ion. '^I wish," he said, "to interpose this law between the 
freedom of discussion and the overbearing sway of that 
tyrannical spirit by which a certain political partyj in this 
country is actuated, which arrogates to itself to speak in the 
name of the people, knows neither moderation, mercy, nor 
justice, regards neither feeling, principle, nor right, and 
sweeps down with relentless fury all that dares detect its 
follies, oppose its progress or resist its domination." The 
Sedition Act, he thought, was the one barrier that stood be- 
tween Democratic fury and public liberty. Harper's whole 
career had been marked by the same zealous support of Ad- 
ministration measures, of ample military and naval prepara- 
tion as the surest means of protection and respect abroad, 
and of avoiding encroachments, especially by France. 

Upon the close of his Congressional career (March 5, 1801), 
Harper set forth a review of his and his party's course in 
Congress. The change which occurred March 4, 1801, was 
the first in our history of one party's giving place to another. 
For twelve years the Federalists had been in pow^er; with 
Jefferson the trial was to be made of something new. "Should 
Mr. Jefferson conduct the Government on rational princi- 
ples," Harper wrote to a friend in South Carolina, "and with 
steadiness, vigor and prudence, his elevation will prove a 
public blessing. The fear that he might not was a suflScient 
reason for opposing his election." He had no love for the 
Democrats, and dwells upon the work of "The Federal Re- 
publicans or Federalists," by whom the affairs of the United 
States have been successfully managed, the friends and asso- 
ciates of Washington, the supporters of Adams, and the 
authors of the Federal Government itself, and of that system 
of domestic and foreign policy by which this nation has been 
conducted with unexampled rapidity in the course of honor, 
prosperity and happiness. These are the men whose system 

*W. Macdonald. Select Documents of U. S. Hist., p, 138. 
tJan. 21, 1801, Annals, p. 940. 
JThe Republicans. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 13 

I adopted from my first entrance into public life, with whom 
it was my pride and boast to have stood, and with whom I 
wish to fall, if fall they must. 

The leading principle of this system as to foreign nations 
had been to preserve peace with all, but to grant privileges 
to none, and to submit to indignities from none, relying for 
the protection of our rights not on the good wiU'of other 
governments, but on our own strength. "By these principles," 
said Harper, "we have maintained the nation in peace, 
through the most general and furious war of modern times. 
England and France were both endeavoring to draw us into 
it. We resisted both and surmounted all difficulties with- 
out an abandonment of national rights or honor. We have 
established a navy which has averted the war, and still pro- 
tects our commerce. With Spain we have settled a terri- 
torial dispute on terms honorable and advantageous to our 
nation." 

In domestic concerns Harper had supported the authority 
of the Federal Government, which alone, he thought, was 
capable of insuring our safety from abroad by opposing a 
united strength, and of maintaining peace at home by check- 
ing the ambition of the states. It was of prime importance 
to make the Federal Government as independent as possible 
of state influence. In every struggle between the Federal 
and the State Governments, Harper considered the State 
Governments as possessing the greater natural strength, 
and therefore thought it his duty to take the part of the 
weaker party. For the same reason he supported the Execu- 
tive against the encroachment of the Legislature. 

A maxim of Harper's was that public officials could not 
be induced to accept public trust unless they could be de- 
cently maintained by the office. Otherwise it would be diffi- 
cult to prevail on men of the highest character to accept 
office. To compensate handsomely all the chief officers of 
Government would cost less than incompetent men might 
waste in a month. 

For revenue commerce is necessary. Harper said nine 
millions derived from imposts cost less and were less than 
four hundred thousand gotten from a whisky tax. For en- 
couraging trade he had advocated establishment of banks, 
encouragement of insurance companies, formation of com- 
mercial treaties, sending consuls to trading countries, erec- 
tion of lighthouses, harbor improvements and coast defenses. 
These had been his principles. In the momentary eclipse 
of these principles by Republican success, when it was said 



14 Robert Ooodloe Harper. 

the sun of Federalism had set forever, Harper did not lose 
hope. 

With confidence he prophesied the final triumph of Fed- 
eralism. "The sun of Federalism may set," he said, ''but it 
will rise again. The mists of Democracy may obscure it for 
a moment, but they cannot tarnish its lustre, much less ex- 
tinguish its light. It may set, but the benighted nation, 
after tossing for a while in the disturbed dream of fancied 
good, will wake to mourn its absence, and sigh for its return. 
It will return. The nation shall hail its approach and re- 
joice in the brightness of its course. Names may change, 
the men who hold the reins may be different, the denomina- 
tion of parties may be altered or forgotten, but the principles 
on which the Federalists have acted must be adopted and 
their plans must be pursued or the Government must fall to 
pieces." 

There have been seven trials on impeachment under the 
Constitution of the United States. In the first three of 
these cases Harper participated, once as one of the managers 
on the part of the House of Representatives and twice as 
counsel for the impeached. These early cases were particu- 
larly important, because they established precedents. Im- 
peachment having been borrowed from the English Consti- 
tution, and having been more or less loosely defined in its 
nature and limits, there arose in the United States uncer- 
tainty as to how much change was necessary in the institu- 
tion as it existed in England. There are two schools of in- 
terpretation. One holds that the power of impeachment ex- 
tends only to such offenders as may afterwards be indicted 
according to law. This was Harper's view. The other 
view is that "high crimes and misdemeanors" embrace not 
only indictable offenses, but also those wider and vaguer 
political offenses not to be reached by the ordinary law. 

The first impeachment to occur under the present Consti- 
tution was that of Senator Blount, of Tennessee.* Blount 
had been in the Continental Congress and had been Gover- 
nor of the Southwest Territory. He aimed at the establish- 
ment of a colony back of the Alleghenies in English inter- 
ests. Congress felt that unless Blount's schemes were 
stamped with infamy the country would fall to pieces.f 

Blount had great favor with the Indians and the people 
of Tennessee, who looked to the Mississippi for an outlet for 

•Wharton, State Trials, p. 317; Annals of Congress, 1797-S. 
tWm. Cobbett's "Peter Porcupine," and Schouler History of the 
United States, 1: 304. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 15 

their trade. He was therefore important it disaffected 
towards the United States. The treaty with Spain in 1795 
was considered very advantageous to the Western Territory. 
But it was feared that a secret article in a treaty between 
Spain and France had ceded Louisiana to France. Blount 
did not like the idea of having the French for neighbors, be- 
cause they would interfere with the settlement of Western 
lands and some of his own lands. He therefore planned to 
put the English in possession of Louisiana and the Floridas, 
if England would hold New Orleans, while he, at the head of 
settlers and Indians, drove the Spaniards from North Amer- 
ica and prevented the French settling in Louisiana. A let- 
ter of Blount's, which implicated him in these treasonable 
schemes* was put into the President's hands, and was read 
in the Senate in Blount's presence. He was arrested and 
impeached (July 7, 1797). Harper was made one of the com- 
mittee to prepare the articles of impeachment. Blount was 
twice bailed to answer the charges, but on July 8, 1797, he 
was expelled from the Senate, having been guilty of a high 
misdemeanor.f The managers, however, proceeded with the 
collection of evidence. January 9, 1798, the articles were 
agreed to. They charged Blount with setting on foot a mili- 
tary expedition against Spain in the interest of England, in- 
citing the Indians against the Spaniards in the Floridas 
and injuring the United States among the Indians. The 
trial did not occur until December 17, 1798. Blount did not 
appear. Harper wished to follow the precedent of the Eng- 
lish law requiring the presence of the accused.t He wished 
the Senate to compel Blount's presence. He was not sup- 
ported in this.§ On December 24 Ingersoll and Dallas ap- 
peared for Blount and urged a lack of jurisdiction, as im- 
peachment is permitted only against the President or any 
civil officer of the United States, and that a Senator is not 
a civil officer. An officer may not avoid punishment by re- 
signing his office.ll But Blount had been expelled. There 
was, therefore, no jurisdiction. The reply of the managers 
was that a Senator is a civil officer, and that impeachment 
is a purely political proceeding, aiming not so much at the 
punishment of the offender as the security of the State. 
Harper's argument is chiefly upon the point whether a Sena- 

*Porcupme's Works, 9: 143. 

tWharton, State Trials, p. 200. 

JFoster on the Constitution. 1: 1. 

SAnnals of Congress, December 21, 1798. 

|This was the point involved in the Bellinap case. 



16 Robert Ooodloc Harper. 

tor is a civil oflQcer.* It was contended by Bayard and 
Harper that the nature, object and extent of impeachment 
must be sought in the common law of England, whence it 
was derived. Dallas exclaimed: "Shall we, in order to 
decide questions respecting our dearest rights, have recourse 
to the dark and barbarous volumes of the common law?"t 
This epithet applied to the common law was caught up by 
Harper and used to great effect. "This," he said, addressing 
Vice-President Jefferson, who presided over the impeach- 
ment court, "reminds me of the worm-eaten volumes of the 
law of nations of which we heard so much in our dispute 
with the French Republic. Citizen Genet, when he found 
himself hard pressed by the authorities from the law of 
nations which our Secretary of State (Jefferson) adduced 
against him, denied the authority of Grotius, Puffendorf and 
Vattel and called their works 'worm-eaten volumes,' whose 
contents, he thanked God, he had long since forgotten. So 
the ingenious counsel for the defense, unable to answer op 
evade the arguments from the common law, gets rid of them 
at once by a coup-de-main a la Genet, and consigns them to 
oblivion as dark and barbarous volumes unworthy of the 
light of the new philosophy." Harper proceeds at length 
to show how the common law of England underlies the 
whole of our jurisprudence, and affects the most vital issues 
of our life, always ringing the changes on the "dark and bar- 
barous volumes of the common law." He supported the 
jurisdiction of the Senate in this case, and replied to the ob- 
jection that no person but an officer of the United States is 
liable to impeachment, and that a Senator is not a civil 
officer. When a term as impeachment, he contended, is 
taken without explanation into our Constitution, every ques- 
tion respecting its meaning must be decided by a reference 
to the code from whence it was drawn. All that our Con- 
stitution provides for is, by whom impeachments shall be 
preferred; by whom and in what manner the impeached shall 
be tried, and what shall be the punishment. In no ease 
shall punishment go beyond removal from office and dis- 
qualification ; and in the case of the President and the Vice- 
President and all civil officers it shall not stop short of re- 
moval. But as to the persons who shall be impeached, be- 
sides those just mentioned, or as to the offenses for which 
they may be impeached, not a word is to be found in the Con- 

* Wharton, State Trials, 1: 296. et sq. 

tDallas had been educated in England at the Temple. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 17 

stitution. The term was intended to have the same mean- 
ing, extent and force as it has in the common law of Eng- 
land. In that law the power of impeachment is unlimited, 
and extends to every person and every oflScer.* Blount was 
then impeachable. But granting that impeachment is lim- 
ited to officers of the Government, a Senator is an officer, 
and so is liable to impeachment. It is not true that none 
but civil officers are liable to impeachment. The Constitu- 
tion contradicts that. In the case of the President and 
Vice-President or any civil officer, it was provided that pun- 
ishment should not be less than removal, though it might 
be more. The distinction between civil officers and other 
officers may have arisen from an opinion that there might 
be danger under some circumstances in removing from his 
command a military officer whom it might, however, be 
proper to censure or suspend. As to military officers, there- 
fore, a complete discretion was left to the Senate, but not as 
to civil officers. They, on conviction, must be removed. 
Military officers may or may not be removed, according to 
circumstances. Had the Constitution intended otherwise it 
would have provided that all civil officers and no other per- 
sons shall be liable to impeachment. But if it can be shown 
that a Senator is an officer of the United States and that a 
seat in the Senate is an office, it will follow that the defend- 
ant is liable to impeachment. Harper then goes on to prove 
that a Senator is an officer and a civil officer of the United 
States. The Constitution, he held, uses the term office in 
the most general sense. According to its derivation office 
signified duty or employment. If the duties relate to the 
Civil Government, the office is a civil office. A Senator is a 
civil officer, since he holds a post which requires the per- 
formance of some duty of a public nature relating to the 
Civil Government. As the duties of the President comprise 
both the civil and the military departments, he would not 
have been included in the designation civil officer. It was, 
therefore, necessary to name him expressly. It is only nec- 
essary to show that a Senator is an officer of the United 
States. The contention that a Senator cannot be considered 
firx officer because there could be no quo warranto to remove 
him fi:^m his place nor mandamus to place him in it is of no 
force, since the same thing applies to the President, Judges, 
Secretaries and Commander-in-Chief of the Army. A Sena- 
tor, then, was, in Harper's view, a civil officer of the United 

*Dr. Sacheverell was impeached iu 1709 for preaching a certain 
sermon. Foster on the Constitution, p. 1: 590; Lecliy, Hist. Eng., 1: 
51 so. 



18 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

States and so liable to impeachment. Senator Blount 
should therefore be tried under the articles preferred against 
him.* When the vote was taken (January 10) it was decided 
(14 to 11) that Blount was not impeachable, because he was 
not a civil officer of the United States. January 25, 1798, 
Mr, Jefferson wrote to Mr, Madison that "Blount's affair is 
to come on next. This will be made the occasion of offering 
a clause for the introduction of juries into these trials," 
(February 8). "But many great preliminary questions will 
arise. Must not a formal law settle the oath of the Senator? 
Form of pleadings, process against persons and goods. May 
he not appear by attorney? Must he not be tried by jury? 
Is a Senator impeachable? Is an ex-Senator impeachable?! 
Harper's position in this first impeachment case was: 1, the 
impeached must be present; 2, his presence may be com- 
pelled; 3, a Senator is a civil officer of the United States and 
is liable to impeachment; 4, the impeached cannot escape 
trial by resignation or expulsion. On the first and second 
points the Senate decided against Harper; on the third, also, 
but the decision has not been wholly acquiesced in. The 
fourth point was not passed upon, but Harper's position was 
sound, and was the view held by the majority of the court 
in the Belknap case. 

The second impeachment in the history of the United 
States was that of Judge John Pickering, of the Federal 
District Court of New Hampshire. This case has appealed 
to the sympathies of many. It appealed to Harper, who had 
now retired from Congress, and was gaining eminence at the 
bar. The articles of impeachment presented by Nicholson 
and John Randolph, of Roanoke,$ charged irregular pro- 
ceedings in Admiralty Jurisdiction and loose morals and 
intemperate habits. § 

♦It appears that all that Harper proved vp-as that members of the 
State Legislatures were officers of the State choosing them. He did 
not prove that the Senator from a State is an officer of the United 
States Government. Blount contended that a Senator is an officer 
of the State choosing him, but not of the United States, by whom 
he was not chosen. Harper's attempt to explain Art. 1, Sec. 6, of 
the Constitution was also futile. 

tFebruary 15. Cf. Ford's Edition of the writings of Jefferson, 7: 
192 to 193; 198 to 199: 202 to 203. 

tMarch 3, 1803, Annals of Congress, 1803-4, p. 15. 

§The testimony in the case is very graphic; see Annals of Con- 
gress, 1803-4, p. 351. Judge Pickering had declared in the Admiralty 

case "that he could finish the business in four minutes." I am 

drunk, but I will be sober by morning." The attorney said he claimed 
an appeal. The judge replied, "Appeal and be ." He gave the 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 19 

March 2, 1804, Judge Pickering was called three times, but 
he did not appear.* Instead, a letter was presented from Har- 
per, enclosing a petition from Pickering and begging that the 
trial be deferred. Harper appeared at the request of Judge 
Pickering's son to support the petition, if he should be al- 
lowed to do so. The son was too poor to send witnesses, and 
Judge Pickering's insanity prevented his taking any action. 
For these reasons Harper begged the privilege of acting for 
the impeached. The managers strongly opposed Harper's ap- 
pearing, and the Senate deliberated nearly all day on the 
admission of Harper. John Quincy Adams, a member of 
the Senate,! wrote that ''the most determined and persever- 
ing opposition is made against having evidence and counsel 
to prove the man insane, only for fear that if insanity should 
be proved he cannot be convicted of high crimes and mis- 
demeanors. Motion was made to assign him counsel to 
plead not guilty, and gave insanity as evidence in mitiga- 
tion, as though an insane man could plead guilty or not 
guilty."! When the managers had retired from the Senate 
Chamber, the Senate heard Harper in support of the peti- 
tion. He read aflQdavits in proof of Pickering's insanity, 
and he "humbly presumed, after testimony so direct and so 
conclusive, scarcely a doubt could possibly remain as to the 
insanity of this most unfortunate man; it cannot be neces- 
sary to prove that our laws except the insane from prosecu- 
tion." Judge Pickering, Harper said, was insane at the 
time the offenses charged were committed, and he was ready 
to prove this if he should be allowed the privilege. He could 
show that before his loss of reason Judge Pickering had 
been a man of unquestioned purity, excellence and ability. 
"When this court shall take into consideration the situation 
of the respondent, oppressed with infirmities and incapable 
of making arrangement for his defense, the inclemency of 
the season, his great distance from the place of trial and* the 
shortness of the notice; when your honors reflect on the high 
and atrocious crime with which he is charged, in the decision 
of which is involved not his life — his remains of life would 
be but a slender sacrifice — but that which is dearer than life 
itself, his good name; when you advert to the consequences 

court's decision and said. "My decree is like those of the Medes and 
Persians, irrevocable." The counsel objected to this, and begged to be 
indulged with a few remarks. "Certainly," said the judge; "go on to 
all eternity." 

•Annals of Congress, 1803-4, p. 327, Memoirs of John Quincy 
Adams, 1: 298. 

tMemoirs, 1: 298. $Memoirs, 1: 299. 



30 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

of a conviction, the indelible stigma which will befall a 
numerous family, whose only patrimony is the unsullied 
reputation of their parent, when your honors shall think 
of these things, the wisdom and justice of this court will 
permit a respondent who is incapable of defending himself 
to be defended by his friends." The dilemma of the man- 
agers was between the determination to remove the man on 
impeachment, though he was insane, and the fear that the 
evidence of his insanity and the argument of counsel might 
affect the popularity of the measure. At least, so it seemed 
to Senator Adams. He further adds that the managers 
lamented that they had to present such a character as Pick- 
ering to the judgment of the Senate, but that the proof was 
so strong and full against him that they should make no ob- 
servation upon it.* The close of the trial is graphically de- 
scribed by John Quincy Adams. f "The time fixed for pro- 
nouncing judgment was already past. The managers and 
the whole House of Representatives were at the door of the 
Senate waiting. Amid confusion and with precipitation a 
form was adopted. $ The doors were thrown open and the 
whole House of Representatives came in with their Speaker 
at their head. The question of guilty was taken on each 
article separately." The result was each time the same, 19 
yeas and 7 nays. The removal from oflSce quickly followed 
and the court adjourned. The second impeachment trial 
was ended. 

The first impeachment had concerned the legislative de- 
partment of the Government. The second had to do with 
the judicial branch. This was the first impeachment trial to 
be carried through. Blount's case was managed by the Fed- 
eralists. Pickering's trial was an attack of the victorious 
Republicans upon the defeated Federalists. The same was 
true in the Chase impeachment. The Federalists were 
greatly alarmed at the result of Pickering's impeachment. 
John Quincy Adams employed one day in writing to Colonel 
Pickering of a plan of declaration to be subscribed by those 
Senators who disapproved of the proceedings in the Picker- 
ing case.§ January 29, 1804. Pickering had written to 
Cabotll that ''Mr. Jefferson's plan of destruction has been 

♦Testimony for Judge Pickering might have been had in abundance 
had Harper been heard by the managers, 
t Memoirs, 1: 308. 
JMemoirs, 1: 297, 
§Memoirs, 1: 303. 
II Lodge's Cabot, p. 337. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 21 

gradually advancing. I do not believe in the practicability 
of a long protracted union. A Northern Confederacy would 
unite congenial characters and present a better prospect of 
public happiness. I greatly doubt whether prudence should 
sufifer the connection to continue much longer. The viola- 
tion of the Constitution in the arbitrary removal of the 
judges may hasten such a crisis." The part taken by Harper 
in the Pickering impeachment was more a friendly effort in 
behalf of the helpless than the work of the advocate. His 
plea was not admitted by the managers, yet posterity is far 
from deciding against it. 

The dramatic feature of the closing session of the Eighth 
Congress was the impeachment of Justice Chase. Upon its 
issue seemed to hang the last hope of the national judiciary, 
if not of the nation.* Chase was personally an upright, 
learned and able man, who had grown gray in his country's 
service. He had signed the Declaration of July 4, ITTG.f 
He had been an ardent Democrat until Washington, against 
advice,! appointed him a Justice of the Supreme Court.§ 
He then became an ardent Federalist. His ill temper was 
the occasion of his trouble. His motives seemed to have 
been pure, but his actions were prejudiced by political opin- 
ion. In the charge to the grand jury in Baltimore|i he used 
very extravagant and abusive language, and much of it was 
pointedly directed against the Republicans, then in power. 
In the court hearing the harangue was John Montgomery,^ 
who wrote a letter to the Baltimore American, June 13, 1803, 
upon the liability to impeachment of Chase for alleged mis- 
behavior in oflSce. A cry for impeachment here begun found 
ready ears in Congress. John Randolph, of Roanoke, the 
Republican leader of the House, moved to impeach Chase 
(January 4, 1804). He reported (March 26. 1804), the eight 
articles of impeachment charging the Justice with act- 
ing on the bench in an arbitrary and unjust manner, so 
that a prisoner was condemned to death without having 
been defended by counsel, and with using rude expression* 
towards counsel,** and with delivering opinions highly inde- 

♦Schoaler, History of the United States, 2, 76. 
tBiography of the Signers, 9: 190. 
tWharton, State Trials, p. 43. 
SSpark's Washington, II, 107, 240. 
II May 2, 1803. Annals of Congress 1804-5, p. 675. 
TfMcMaster, History of the United States, 3, 170, Annals 1804-5, 231. 
•♦These charges referred to the trial of Fries and Collendar in May, 
1800, under the Alien and Sedition Laws. 



32 Robert Ooodloe Harper. 

tent, tending to prostitute the judicial character with 
which he was invested to the low purpose of an electioneer- 
ing partisan. This was the real offense. The impeachment 
court was held Jan. 2, 1805. Chase appeared and made a 
speech and showed his characteristic ill temper by observ- 
ing that they, the Congress of the United States, '^were pul- 
ing in their nurse's arms," whilst he was contributing his 
utmost aid to lay the groundwork of American liberty.* 
Aaron Burr was Vice-President and he "presided with the 
impartiality of an angel and the rigor of a devil."t The 
counsel for Chase were Harper, Joseph Hopkins, Philip B. 
Key, Charles Lee, and Luther Martin. The trial began Feb. 
4, 1805, and Harper and Hopkins presented the defense of 
Chase. Chase's answer to the articles had been prepared 
by Harper,! and maintained that there was no high crime 
or misdemeanor particularly alleged in the articles to which 
Chase was bound by law to answer,§ and that in the trial 
of Fries if Chase erred he followed precedent and should 
not therefore be held guilty. || Harper contended that only 
civil oflScers are subject to impeachment and then only for 
acts done in violation of some law. No civil oflScer can be 
indicted except for an indictable offense. These were the 
same views that he had set forth in the Blount case. To 
the real onus of the impeachment, the political harangue 
of the judge. Harper and Hopkinson replied that there was 
no law which forbade such speeches, and without the 
breach of some law there could be no impeachment.^ It was 
the very essence of despotism, they said, to punish for acts 
which were forbidden by no law. Moreover, it had been 
the practice ever since the Revolution** for the judges to 
express from the bench by way of charge to the grand jury 
political opinions. The Legislature had at times recom- 
mended the practice. It was adopted by the judges of the 
Supreme Court, and by not forbidding it Congress had 
given it an implied sanction.ff To punish the practice now 
by impeachment was to make it a crime by ex post facto 

♦The preparations for the trial are graphically given by Charles 
Evans, Report of the Trial of the Honorable Samuel Chase, &c., Bal- 
timore, 1805, p. 3, ADnals of Congress 1804-5, p, 100. 

fParton, Life of Andrew Jackson, 1: 309. 

tRobert Walsh, Jr., Enc. Americana. 

§Annals 1804-5, p. 102. 

II Annals 1804-5, p. 109. 

iJAnnals 1804-5, pp. 146 and 305. 

**Annals 1804-5, pp. 146 and 305. 

ttAnnals 1804-5, p. 147. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 23 

proceedings. John Randolph of Roanoke made an eloquent 
reply on the part of the Managers.* His line of argument 
was followed more or less closely by the other Managers. 
Luther Martin's argument for Chase was the climax of his 
career.f Harper went beyond his associates in narrowing 
the field of impeachment into a criminal prosecution, found- 
ed on the violation of some law. Everything with which 
they were surrounded in that chamber, he said, showed that 
it was a court of law and the whole transaction was a trial 
of a criminal case on legal principle. The Managers them- 
selves resort to legal authorities to prove the acts charged 
to be impeachable offenses. The authorities sanctioned by 
the practice of one hundred and fifty years proves the prin- 
ciple for which Harper contended, both English and Ameri- 
can legal authorities and the Constitution of the United 
States shows that impeachment is not an inquiry into the 
qualification of ofiicers, but is a criminal prosecution of the 
violation of some law. No offense is impeachable unless it be 
proved to be the proper subject of indictment. "The Consti- 
tution is a limited branch of power not expressly or by nec- 
essary implication granted away. When, therefore, the Con- 
stitution declares for what act an ofiicer shall be impeached, 
it gives power to impeach him for those acts, and all power 
to impeach him for any other act is withheld." ''This provis- 
ion of the Constitution, therefore, must be considered as a 
declaration that no impeachment shall lie, except for a crim- 
inal violation of some law." In the State Constitutions, also, 
impeachment has been considered a criminal prosecution 
for defined offenses. This is a sheet anchor or personal 
rights and political privileges. Without it everything is 
treason if tried before the party in power when unfavorable 
to the impeached. Nothing is treason when tried by friends. 
When the law defining offenses is fixed and certain every 
man is safe, but when passion and political views enter a 
trial justice is gone. 

The effort of Harper and his colleagues were crowned with 
success. The principle that impeachment applied only to 
indictable offenses was sustained. The court declared that 
"Samuel Chase stands acquitted of all the articles exhibited 
against him,"t It has been maintained that the impeach- 
ment of Justice Chase is a landmark in American history, 

•Annals 1804-5, pp. 151 and 153. 

tH. Adams, Hist, of U. S., 2, 232, Annals 1804-5, p. 429. 

JAnnals 1804-5, p. 669. 



34 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

because it overthrew the Jeffersonian Republicans in their 
last aggressive battle for the popular control of the ju- 
diciary.* The failure of the impeachment also overthrew 
the authority of John Randolph, of Roanoke. He hurried 
from the impeachment court to the House with an amend- 
ment to the Constitution providing that "the Judges of the 
Supreme Court and all other courts of the United States 
shall be removed by the President on the joint address by 
both Houses of Congress." Nicholson moved another 
amendment that "The Legislature of any State might when- 
ever it thought proper recall a Senator and vacate his 
seat.f In the opinion of Jefferson| it proved impeachment 
to be a mere scarecrow and "made a judiciary feel secure in 
undermining our confederated fabric by construing our 
Constitution from a co-ordination of a general and especial 
government to a general and supreme one alone." Mar- 
shall was henceforth safe in fixing his principles of Consti- 
tutional law. No point of law was decided by the trial. 
The theory of Randolph was still intact, while Harper and 
his colleagues were defeated neither by argument nor by 
the court's decision. Chase was declared innocent of any 
impeachable offence, and impeachment was seen to be an 
unwieldy instrument. It lay unused for a quarter of a 
century after this. The points insisted upon in these trials 
by Harper were: 1, that the impeached must be present; 
2, that his presence may be compelled; 3, that a Senator is 
a civil oflScer and is liable to impeachment; 4, the impeached 
cannot escape trial by resignation or expulsion; 5, that the 
friends of the impeached may take up his defense if he is 
incapacitated; 6, that impeachment cannot be against those 
who are legally incapable of pleading guilty or not guilty; 

7, that the English law and customs are to be observed as 
precedents in interpreting the Constitutional provisions; 

8, only indictable offenses, violations of some law, are im- 
peachable; 9, impeachment is not an inquiry into qualifica- 
tion for office, but is a criminal prosecution. 

Harper left Congress with the downfall of the Federalists 
in March, 1801. 

In May he was married to Miss Catherine Carroll, daugh- 
ter of Charles Carroll, of Carrollton. Large debts growing 
out of land speculations had greatly interefered with his 
winning the hand of Miss Carroll. Her father was stren- 

♦H. Adams, Life of Jolin Randolph, of Roanoke, p. 131. 
tH. Adams, Hist, of the U. S., 2, 240; Hildreth, U. S., 5, 544. 
JWorks 7, 192. 



Bohert Goodloe Harper. 26 

uously opposed to the match. But Harper now enjoyed the 
good offices of Mr. Richard Caton, Mr. Carroll's son-in-law, 
who knew how to sympathize with him. The correspond- 
ence between Mr. Carroll and Mr. Harper was straightfor- 
ward and reflects credit upon Mr. Harper. It was under 
these circumstances that Harper prepared the sketch of his 
life, which has been used in this article. 

He settled in Baltimore and devoted himself to his prac- 
tice. His residence was on Gay street, near Water street. 
Harper now enjoyed an inconie of from seven to ten thou- 
sand dollars a year, and his wire brought him a large dowery 
in lands. 

Soon after settling in Baltimore, Harper came out in a 
pamphlet signed ''Bystander," in which he advocated the 
election of Presidential electors by the Legislature instead 
of by popular vote. Roger Brooke Taney speaks of the 
pamphlet as havingi4:he force and eloquence for which Har- 
p">r was known. "It convinced me," he said, "and I at once 
took grounds in 'favor of the measure. Some of the Federal- 
ists objected to it, and it was attacked by the friends of Mr. 
Jefferson."* 

Justice Story frequently saw Harper in Washington at 
the Supreme Court, and describes him as "diffuse, but me- 
thodical and clear. He argues with considerable warmth, 
and seems to depend upon the deliberate suggestions of his 
mind. I am inclined to think he studies his cases with great 
diligence, and is to be considered as in some degree arti- 
ficial."! 

Baltimore, at the time of Harper's locating there, was a 
town of 31,000 people,J but it was without an adequate water 
supply. Wells and springs were depended upon.§ In April, 
1S04, Harper was appointed on a committee, embracing 
many familiar names in the city's history, to report a plan 
and constitution of a water company.]] Harper and others 
were appointed to open subscription books for the stock. 
But only when they had used their personal influence was 
the stock taken and the company organized, May 24, 1804. 
The directors of the company were John McKim, Sr., James 
A. Buchanan, Jonathan Ellicott, Solomon Etting, John Don- 

*Tyler, Memoir of Taney, p. 91. 
tStory, "Life of W. W. Story," 1: 162, 214, 252, 279. 
$GrifBth, "Annals of Baltimore." 
§Scharf, "Baltimore City and County." p. 213. 
II Griffith, "Annals of Baltimore, p. 3, 171. Scharf, "Baltimore City 
and County." p. 213. 



26 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

nell, William Cooke, James Mosher and Robert Goodloe 
Harper.* The Baltimore Water Company remained in ex- 
istence until 1853. t 

In 1815 Harper co-operated with prominent business men 
in forming The Baltimore Exchange Company. January 25, 
1816, the company was incorporated and authorized to erect 
the Baltimore Exchange. Harper was one of the first Board 
of Directors.} The exchange was said at the time to have 
had no rival in America. Benj. H. Latrobe, the architect of 
the cathedral, furnished the design. § 

Harper was not only publi(?-spirited, and interested in the 
improvement of his adopted city, he also took great interest 
in its social affairs. In 1810 we find him one of the manag- 
ers of the Baltimore Dancing Assembly. The assembly was 
an old organization. The lower floor of the assembly rooms 
at Holliday and Fayette streets was occupied by the Balti- 
more Library Company. In this coni,pany were William 
Wirt, Archbishop Carroll, J. P. Kennedy, Robert Goodloe 
Harper, William Gwynn and others. The home of William 
Gwynn was also the home of the earliest Baltimore club, 
the Delphian Club, which met at "Gwynn's Folly" or '*Tuscu- 
lum," in the rear of Barnum's Hotel. Some of the papers 
of the Delphian Club may still be seen in their "Red Book," 
which was published fortnightly during 1818-1819. Harper 
was a member of the Delphian Club, and there met with 
John Neal, later a writer for Blackwood's Magazine, and 
who spoke in praise of Harper's writings; Jared Sparks, the 
historian and biographer, who ably supported Harper's col- 
onization plans, 1 1 and Francis Scott Key. The list of distin- 
guished associates Harper found at the Delphian Club is 
long, and includes the authors of such familiar verses as 
"Home, Sweet Home," "Old Oaken Bucket," "Airs of Pales- 
tine," and "Rock Me to Sleep, Mother."^ 

In General Harper's law office in 1808 was Robert Walsh, 
Jr. (1784-1859), who afterwards wrote for Francis Lieber's 
Americana Encyclopedia a biographical sketch of Harper, 
among other Americans. Walsh, in 1811, started the first 
quarterly ever published in the United States, "The Ameri- 
can Review of History and Politics." The Review only 

*Griffith, "Annals of Baltimore," 171. 
tScharf, "Baltimore City and County," 215. 
tGriffith, "Annals of Baltimore," 214. 
§Scharf, "Baltimore City and County," 437. 
II North American Review, Jan. 1824. 
IfScharf, "Baltimore City and County." 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 27 

lived two years. In November, 1810, Walsh wrote to Har- 
per that the Review was recommended by the most distin- 
guished Federalists, and he hoped it would meet with Har- 
per's approval. *'I shall rely on your assistance in promot- 
ing the work not only in Baltimore, but in the South, where 
you have so many friends."* v 

At a dinner in Georgetown, June 5, 1813, in honor of re- 
cent Russian victories. Harper gave as a toast "Alexander 
the Deliverer." Walsh replied to this speech when pub- 
lished, claiming that the military character of Napoleon had 
been underrated, and that Harper had failed to point out 
the dangers of Russian ascendancy. This provoked a long 
correspondence, which was published. Walsh says that 
General Harper was a diligent student of literature, history, 
geography, travels, statistics, moral philosophy, political 
science, and especially of political economy. No one was 
better acquainted with foreign affairs than General Harper. 

In 1814, Harper published two columns of "Select Works." 
These consist of speeches on political and forensic subjects, 
and political tracts, which had previously appeared as 
pamphlets or addresses.f 

His "Observations on the Dispute with France," Walsh 
says, "acquired great celebrity at home and passed through 
several editions in England, and was esteemed over Europe 
one of the ablest productions of the crisis." 

In 1819-1820 General Harper made an extensive tour in 
England, France and Italy.J In 1820 Princeton College 
conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Laws.§ Robert 

*MS. letter in Johns Hopkins University, in "Walsh's Appeal from 
the Judgment of Great Britain," 1819, the first pro-slavery work ever 
published. 

fAmong the titles are "Address to His Constituents," a defense 
of the Jay Treaty, Philadelphia, 1795; "Observations on the Dispute 
between the United States and France," London, 1797; "CJorrespond- 
ence with George Nicholas on His Political Conduct in the Sixth 
Congress," Lexington, Ky.. 1799; "Correspondenee with Robert 
Walsh, Jr.," Philadelphia, 1813; "Address in Favor of the Potomac 
Canal," 1824; "Oration on the Birth of Washington," Alexandria, 
1810; "Speech at the Celebration of the Recent Triumph of Man- 
kind in Germany," Alexandria. 1814; "Letter to the Colonization 
Society," Baltimore, 1818; and "Arguments on the Blount and Chase 
Impeachments." 

JWhile in Rome a bust of the General was executed by Trentanove. 
Copies of this bust, which is in the possession of Dr. Clapham Pen- 
nington, are at the Peabody Library, Maryland Historical Society's 
Rooms, and in the Johns Hopkins University. 

§ Letter from Dr. J. O. Murray, Princeton University, February 10, 
1898. 



28 Rolert Goodloe Harper. 

Walsh describes him at this time as being above the middle 
stature, well shaped, muscular, erect and active in habits. He 
was warm-hearted, tender and generous. He gave aid, 
praise and sympathy, showed elegant hospitality and en- 
joyed young and gay society. He was a brilliant conversa- 
tionalist; an animated and sufficiently fluent and very per- 
spicuous orator. He had a facility in applying general prin- 
ciples and in seizing the moment of excited curiosity for ex- 
hibiting motives or consequences. 

When the British attacked Baltimore in 1814, Harper, 
who had held a commission in a voluntary artillery com- 
pany,* greatly exerted himself at the battle of North Point. 
He was in the hottest of the fight.f In October, 1814, he 
was commissioned Major-General of the forces of Maryland. 
When the corner-stone of the Battle Monument was laid, 
September 13, 1815, General Harper was in command,! and 
likewise on the occasion of the laying of the corner-stone of 
the Washington Monument, July 4, 1816. 

When Lafayette visited Baltimore in 1824, General Harper 
took a prominent part in the very elaborate ceremonies. § 

On January 27, 1816, General Harper was elected United 
States Senator by the Senate and House of Delegates of 
Maryland.il The "^ Senator took his seat February 5, 1816.^ 
No measure of great importance arose during the session, 
but wherever issues arose Harper was heard. A few days 
after his entrance he gave notice of his intention to bring 
in a bill for the establishment of a law library at the Capi- 
tal,** for the use of the Supreme Court of the United States; 
and, also, a bill for limiting the right of appeal and writ of 
error from the Circuit Court of the United States.ff An 
amendment to the Constitution had been proposed regard- 
ing the mode of choosing Representatives and Electors. Har- 

♦Griffith, "Annals of Baltimore," 212. 

tParkins, "History of the War of 1812, 341. Niles' Register. 

ischarf, "Baltimore City and County," p. 268. 

§Mr. Levasseur, Lafayette in Amerique, 2: 1, described the occa- 
sion: 

"Le G6n6ral Harper ouvrit la stance par un diseours foi't instruc- 
tif sur les progrfis et I'Stat actuel de ragriculture dans le Mary- 
land * * * Le meme jour (Dimanche) le corps d'officlers des 
milices fut presents par le g6n§ral Harper, qui prononga un diseours 
dont le passage suivant me parut tout a fait remarqu^ble," etc. 

II Votes and proceedings of the Senate, page 3, of the House, page 
8, December session, 1816. 

IfBenton, "Abridgment," 5: 460. 

**Annals of Congress, 1816-17, p. 136. 

ttAnnals of Congress, 1816, p. 136. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 29 

per was a supporter of the proposed change, on the ground 
that the amendment would make the election of the Presi- 
dent less a matter of juggle and intrigue than it then was. 
Party bargains would not be so easy between state and state 
for the great offices. Districting the states for the election 
of Electors would tend to render the choice more free and 
independent.* He opposed the election of the President 
solely by the popular vote, because that threw out of view 
the Federal principle by which the sovereignty of the states 
were represented. It weuld destroy the influence of the 
smaller states and multiply the principle of compromise on 
which our Constitution rests.f When a bill was presented 
for the incorporation of the Washington Female Orphan 
Asylum Harper opposed it, because he thought it contrary 
to the whole course of our laws, and a strange anomaly to 
see a body politic made up wholly of married women.| The 
proposed change ^f pay to Senators and Representatives 
from six dollars a day to fifteen hundred dollars a year and 
to deduct from this an amount in proportion for absence or 
irregularity was opposed by some as being extravagant. It 
would double former allowances and would be larger pay 
than many of the states give to their principal officers. The 
change proposed found a champion in Harper, and it was 
carried. § Although the session of the Senate afforded Gen- 
eral Harper no adequate field for his abilities, yet a speech 
he made April 4 is noteworthy when read in the light of re- 
cent events. The occasion was a proposed amendment to a 
navigation bill introduced by Mr. Bibb, of the Committee on 
Foreign Affairs. || The bill proposed to confine American 
navigation to American seamen. Harper's amendment to 
this had for its object the gradual exclusion from the navy 
and from the merchant service all those who were not na- 
tive or at that time already naturalized citizens of the United 
States,^ and also the compelling of merchant vessels to keep 
on board a number of American apprentices. The exclusion 
of foreign sailors, he said, would save us from more trouble 
about impressment, and the American apprentices would 
furnish skillful seamen in time of war, especially war with 

♦Annals, 1816-17; p. 221. 
t Annals, 1816-17; p. 225. 
JAnnals, p. 189. 
§Annals, 1816, 1817; p. 203. 
IIAnnals, p. 372. 

ilAnnals, 1815-16; p. 229. He later withdrew his amendment, An- 
nals, p. 297. 



30 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

England, then apparently impending.* The United States 
asserted it as a right to incorporate foreigners into our na- 
tion by naturalizing them. This drew them from their na- 
tive allegiance. The United States had made an advance 
beyond other nations in holding that these naturalized citi- 
zens of hers must be protected to the same extent as native 
citizens. England had from time immemorial held that alle- 
giance is perpetual ; that it cannot be alienated save by con- 
sent of sovereign and subject both. All other governments 
but the United States held the same doctrine. How far 
would it be wise to contest these principles when the uni- 
versal opinion of mankind, save in the United States, was 
against it? Zeal and sacrifice of person and property could 
only be expected of men in a case of which they approve.! 
We could not expect always to remain in peace. Conflicts 
from time to time with England seemed inevitable. The 
important matter was to be ready. Future conflicts would 
be on the sea, and on the sea we were destined at the last to 
be the supreme power.J ''There is the true scene of our 
glory." The best support of the power was not ships, nor 
money, but a brave, hardy and numerous class of native and 
patriotic seamen. It was the man behind the gun. These 
money cannot buy. Hirelings can never do what brave 
patriots will do. 

Before the end of the year (December 1, 1816), General 
Harper, finding that a conscientious discharge of public du- 
ties would rob him wholly of time for his private concerns, 
resigned his seat in the Senate. § He retired to private life 
and the management of his business. 

At the election in 1816, Harper had received the votes of 
Delaware for Vice-President of the United States, and again 
in 1820. 

On the western coast of Africa is the home of a unique 
nation. The history of this nation tells of helpless human 
creatures, stolen from savagery and carried with untold 
sufferings over the sea to be sold as chattels. Slowly ex- 
changing there in patient servitude savagery for civiliza- 
tion, they unconsciously drew near to a higher destiny. 
Again they crossed the sea, not as naked savages worth so 

♦Annals, p. 284. 
fAnnals, p. 284. 
lAnnals, p. 292. 

§December session, 1816, Maryland House of Delegates; Votes and 
Proceedings, Senate, p. 3; House, p. 8. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 31 

much cash, but as carriers of the benefits of civilization to 
their original home. 

To-day these ex-slaves are a free, independent nation, oc- 
cupying a territory three times as large as the State of Vir- 
ginia, Their population of nearly two millions live under 
a government modeled after that of the greatest of republics. 
With creating this peculiar nation General Harper had 
much to do. Whether the scheme was Utopian or not is of 
no consequence. The colony of Liberia must ever be of in- 
terest as the first and only colony planted by the United 
States. Liberia is of far greater interest as an attempt to 
cure the sore on the body politic; an attempt which might 
have prevented the paroxysm of 1861-5 and settled a ques- 
tion which looms upon the horizon to-day. 

It may be plainly shown from the writings of Washington, 
Jefferson, Madison, Henry, Mason and many others that 
there long existed a desire in the South for the abolition of 
negro slavery. Thadesire did not ripen into a definite plan. 

On January 2, 1800, a petition was presented to Congress 
by the free blacks of Philadelphia, in which they protested 
against the slave trade, and asked for legislation in behalf 
of fugitive slaves and for steps looking to the emancipation 
of slaves. 

This petition was successfully opposed by John Randolph, 
of Roanoke, and Robert Goodloe Harper, on the ground that 
it was prompted by religious fanaticism, and that Congress 
had no power to act in the premises.* 

Harper's opposition was not, however, due to any pro- 
slavery views, for on May 3 he advocated the abolition of the 
slave trade between the United States and any foreign coun- 
try.f 

The Virginia Legislature, December 31, 1800, in conse- 
quence of a slave conspiracy about Richmond, secretly re- 
quested Governor Monroe to correspond with the President 
of the United States on the subject of buying lands without 
the limits of the United States, whither "persons obnoxious 
to the laws and dangerous to the peace of society may be 
removed."! 

Mr. Jefferson favored the plan, and corresponded with the 
British Government concerning Sierra Leone and with Spain 
regarding lands in South America. These attempts failed, 

*"Benton's Abridgment," 2: 439. 
fBenton's Abridgment." 2: 439. 
f'Benton's Abridgment," 2: 477. 



32 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

and January 22, 1805, an effort was made to secure lands in 
Louisiana.* 

Jefferson's views are given in a letter to John Lynd, 
January 21, 1811, in which he declares he has "ever thought 
that Colonization in Africa the most desirable measure for 
drawing off this part of our population.'' ''Nothing is more 
to be wished," he says in another letter, "than that the 
United States w^ould themselves undertake to make such an 
establishment on the coast of Africa." 

One of the greatest obstacles in the way of manumission 
of the slaves was the wretched condition of the free blacks. 
Jared Sparks said that "the free people of color are a greater 
nuisance to society, more comfortless, tempted to more vices, 
and actually less qualified to enjoy existence than the sav- 
ages themselves."! 

John Randolph, of Roanoke, was of the opinion that "thou- 
sands of citizens would by manumitting their slaves relieve 
themselves from the cares attendant upon their possession, 
if there were only some means of disposing of the free 
blacks.J 

Here there arose the need of a movement towards coloni- 
zation and of colonization on a large scale. This movement 
was undertaken by the American Society for the Coloniza- 
tion of the Free People of Color. 

Rev. Robert Finley was the founder of the American Col- 
onization Society. He went to Washington, and succeeded 
in gathering a meeting of citizens December 21, 1816. Henry 
Clay presided at this meeting. § The society was regularly 
organized and officered January 1, 1817. || 

*See "Mercer's Report," March 3, 1827, Nineteenth Congress, sec- 
ond session; House Reports, No. 101, and Birney's Colonization Pam- 
phlets, 1824-1833, Vol. 19, and Kennedy's Report, 1843. 

tH. B. Adams' "Life and Writings of Jared Sparks," 1: 248. 

tMercer's Report, Nineteenth Congress, second session, House Re- 
ports No. 101, p. 30. Virginia kept at the question until her Legisla- 
ture memorialized Congress December 23, 1816. Maryland, Tennes- 
see and Georgia followed. H. B. Adams, Life and Writings of Jared 
Sparks, 1: 2.52. 

§Dr. Finley had left Princeton about the time Harper was at col- 
lege. He was afterwards President of the University of Georgia, 
He published "Thoughts on the Colonization of the Free Blacks." 
1816. "Memoirs of Rev. Robt. Finley, D. D.," etc. By Rev. Isaac V. 
Brown, A. M. New Brunswick, 1819. 

II The first officers of the society were Bushrod Washington, Will- 
iam H. Crawford, Henry Clay, John Eager Howard and Andrew 
Jackson. Other members were Daniel Webster, John Randolph of 
Roanoke, Francis Scott Key and C. F. Mercer. The Presidents of 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 33 

Samuel J. Mills, in 1808, organized at Williams College, 
for missionary work, a society, which was soon transferred 
to Andover and became eventually the American Bible So- 
ciety and the American Board of Foreign Missions. The 
idea of Mills was to colonize negroes between the Ohio and 
the lakes, or in Africa. When Mills went to study theology 
at Princeton he interested the Presbyterian ministers in his 
scheme and among them Dr. Finley.* 

General Harper was among the original members.f 

In 1803, Mr. Latrobe executed a painting of the society's 
colony, "Maryland in Liberia," and hung it in the Senate 
Chamber at Annapolis.$ 

The society declared its objects to be to promote and exe- 
cute a plan for colonizing, with their consent, the free people 
of color in Africa or such other place as Congress should 
designate.§ This was the first and only society ever organ- 
ized for the explicit purpose of giving the negro perfect free- 
dom, of promoting his education for rhis own good, of mak- 
ing him independent, and of elevating his race to the stand- 
ard of a Christian nation.il 

But the society met with great oppositional both from slav- 
ery advocates, who feared an interference with their rights, 
and from anti-slavery men, who feared that the society was 
working in the interest of the slave trade to raise the price 
of slaves by reducing their number. Nearly all the noted 
abolitionists after 1831 had been before that colonizationists. 

Benjamin Lundy's travels through North America had 
been for the purpose of finding a location for a free black 
colony in Texas or in Mexico. James C Birney was the 
society's agent for Alabama and Tennessee.** 

It was William Lloyd Garrison, a printer from Mas- 
sachusetts, who had worked for Lundy as publisher 
of " Genius of Universal Emancipation " in Balti- 
more, who made war on the colonization scheme, 1829-30, 

the societv have been Biishrod Washington. 1817-1830; Charles Car- 
roll of Ca'rrollton, 1830-1833; James Madison. 1S33-183G; Henry Clay, 
1836-1853; J. H. B. Latrobe, 1853-1891; Bishop H. C. Potter, 1891- 
1898. (A. C. S. Reports and "Liberia.") 

♦Johns Hopkins University Studies 9: 497. 

fj. H. B. Latrobe's address in the "Semi-Centennial Report," A. 
C. S., 1867. 

tBaltimore American. March 10, 1885. 

§A. C. S. Reports. 1818, 1; 1. 

II A. N. Bell, The Debt of Africa, the Hope of Liberia, 1881. 

TThis line of division was intensified until it became the great 
chasm opening towards the Civil War. 

**Alexauder Johnston in Lalor 1:3. 



U t^c. 



34 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

and in his fiery zeal for immediate and unconditional eman- 
cipation fanned fanaticism to a white heat. 

Under these circumstances General Harper came to the 
rescue of the society, and defended it against both classes 
of opposers. August 20, 1817, he wrote a long letter, in 
which he set forth the advantages of colonization to the 
blacks themselves. He showed that the first gain of all 
would be to our own people by ridding us of the idle and 
vicious class of free blacks. They are condemned to a hope- 
less degradation by their color, which is an indelible mark 
of their origin. This mark establishes forever an impassable 
barrier between them and the whites. This barrier rests 
upon our habits, our feelings, on our prejudices, but whether 
prejudice or feelings it makes us recoil from the idea of an 
intimate union with the free blacks. A state of equality 
between the races, which alone could make us one people, 
is simply impossible. Be their industry ever so good, their 
conduct ever so correct, their property ever so great, we may 
admire their character; we never could consent and they 
never could hope to see the two races placed on a footing 
of perfect equality with each other. They never could visit 
our homes or participate in public honors and employment. 
This is strictly true of every part of our country, even of 
those parts where slavery has long ceased to exist and is 
held in abhorence. 

''There is no State in the Union," General Harper said, 
"where a negro or mulatto can ever hope to be a member of 
Congress, a judge, or a militia ofiicer, or even a justice of the 
peace; to sit down at the table with respectable whites or 
mix freely in their society. 

'Taul Cuffee,* respectable. Intelligent and wealthy, has no 
chance of ever being invited to dine with a gentleman in 
Boston or of marrying his daughter, whatever may be her 
education or fortune, to one of their sons." 

These passages are very striking in the light of subse- 
quent developments, claims and accomplished facts. Gen- 
eral Harper goes on in his argument to show how different 
slavery in the United States was from servitude in any other 
country, and why the liberated slave found his lot so much 

*Paul Cuffee, of Boston, son of an Indian woman, and a native 
African father, was born off the coast of Massachusetts. He became 
a sailor, then a trader, and acquired wealth. He was an influential 
Quaker. He manned his vessels wholly with negroes. In 1811 he 
went in his own ship to Sierra Leone to study its condition, and in 
1815 he took out 38 negro emigrants at his own expense. A second 
expedition was interrupted by his death. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 35 

harder than that of freedmen in other countries and other 
ages. 

Slavery then existed in more than three-fourths of the 
globe, but the great body of slaves everywhere, except in 
America, were of the same race, origin and color, and of the 
same general character as the free men. So it was among 
the ancients. Under such conditions manumission not only 
removed the slave from the condition of slavery, but also 
exempted him from its consequences and opened the way for 
a full participation in all the privileges of freedom. He 
was raised to an equality with the free class, and might 
wash out the stains of his former degradation and obliterate 
its memory. In the United States, General Harper said, 
this is impossible, for you may manumit the slave, but you 
cannot make him a white man. He still remains a negro, 
and the mark of his former condition still adheres to him 
and forms a barrier which can never be removed. The de- 
basement which was formerly compulsory becomes habitual 
and voluntary. Far better was the condition of a well- 
cared-for slave than that of the wretched freedman. As 
long as the freedman existed in the midst of slavery he was 
not only hopeless, but he was a corrupting influence upon 
slaves and a constant menace to order. General Harper 
urged that to remove this class from their position of danger 
to society and of hopelessness and put them in an environ- 
ment suited to their needs was the most reasonble solution 
of the problem. And colonization was aiming at just this 
result. Moreover, colonization would tend, he claimed, to 
rid the people of the United States entirely of slaves and 
slavery. From this point of view colonization most strongly 
appealed to him and to the world for support. "No person," 
he says, "who has seen the slave-holding States and those 
where slavery does not exist can have failed to have been 
struck with the difference in favor of the latter. In popula- 
tion, in general diffusion of wealth and comfort, in educa- 
tion, manners and mode of life of the middle class, in roads, 
bridges and rivers, in schools and churches, and in general 
advancement, there was no comparison. The change is ap- 
parent the instant you cross the line which separates the 
country where there are slaves and where there are none." 
General Harper was of the opinion that to substitute a 
free white class of laborers for slaves was as practicable as 
it would be beneficial, and that colonization was the first 
step in this direction. All emancipation which permits the 
emancipated person to remain in this country was an evil; 



36 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

for it to extend to the whole black race would be intolerable. 
But he gave his hearty support to a society which would 
open the way for colonization and thereby relieve the coun- 
try of the impending evil. If the freed blacks could be 
colonized in Africa they would become free in fact and 
would have no hindrance from a white population remind- 
ing them of their former degradation.* 

This fact would induce more frequent manumission, and 
this in turn would have a good effect upon the slaves. More- 
over, the gain to commerce would be great and, above all, 
would be the beneficent effect upon Africa from this return 
ot her own race, carrying knowledge and civilization with 
them. 

Some persons advocated the sending of colonists to Sierra 
Leone, but General Harper opposed this on the ground of 
the greater advance in geographical knowledge of Africa. 
We ought to profit, he said, by the misfortune of Sierra 
Leone, and make first choice of locations, and lay a sure 
foundation good for the distant future. Indeed, the colony 
should be as distant as possible from Sierra Leone, in order 
to avoid any complication with its people.f 

He wished to see ''our colony republican and fashioned 
with a view to self-government and independence, at the 
earliest possible period, for thus only can it be most useful 
to the colonists, to Africa and to us." His foresight in the 
choice of a proper site for the colony assured its future. It 
must be in communication with the Niger river, destined, 
he said, to be the connecting channel between interior Africa 
and the world. | 

Above all. Harper insisted upon the choice of a place that 
would be strategic for the future. He believed in the future 
of Africa, and at the end of his letter allowed his feelings to 
burst out in anticipation of the ''hope of success which seems 
suflScient to stimulate us to the utmost exertion. Who can 
count the millions that in a future time shall know and bless 

♦One of the causes of the prejudices at present existing in Liberia 
between the native Africans and the Afro-Americans is the oft-heard 
taunt from the natives of "Slave" applied to the natives of Liberia. 
Fred. Douglass in Johnson's Encyclopedia. 

tFailure to follow this suggestion of General Harper led to inde- 
pendence of Liberia, July 6, 1847. 

JHe relied for information of the geography of Africa upon Park, 
Maxwell, Riley and other travelers. Geography had been a favorite 
study with him. His wide knowledge of it and his experience as a 
surveyor were now of great service to him. His choice of Mesurado, 
instead of Sherbrough, was amply justified in the sequel. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 37 

the names of those by whom this magnificent scheme has 
been conceived and shall be carried into execution? Through- 
out the widely extended regions of Middle and Southern 
Africa, then filled with populous and polished natives, their 
praises shall be sung when other States shall have run their 
round of grandeur and decay, and shall no longer be known, 
except by vague report of their former greatness." 

General Harper's views created a profound impression 
and assured the success of the society. Jared Sparks wrote 
in the North American Review, January, 1824: "General 
Harper's views are philosophical, just in principle and fact." 

His suggestions were acted on in the fall of 1817, and an 
exploring party was sent to Africa. The expedition so 
drained the society that it might have been ruined but for 
the help of President Monroe,* who, by a liberal construc- 
tion of an act of Congress, co-operated with the society, and 
^33,000 was put at their disposal. Eighty-six negroes were 
sent out and arrived in Africa in March, 1829. Most of them 
did not survive the fever. Twenty-eight more were sent 
March, 1821. In April, 1822, the first permanent settlement 
was made. The struggle for life against the climate and 
the natives makes a thrilling story which cannot be related 
here.f 

February, 1824, the "Cyrus" took out one hundred and 
three negroes from about Petersburg, Richmond and Nor- 
folk, Va. The "Oswego," May, 1823, had carried two negroes, 
freed in order that they might go to Liberia, the "Cyrus" had 
eleven such; while in 1824 the "Nautilus" carried one hun- 
dred and forty-nine such.t The cost of transportation was 
as low as |26 a head.§ The funds of the society were gotten 
from the annual fee of one dollar, the life fee of $30 and from 
legacies and gifts. Koskiusko left |20,000 for young negro 
women. This was used to buy a farm for training children 
for the colony.y Rev. William Meade, later Bishop Meade, 
collected much money in Virginia and the South for the so- 
ciety. General Harper was a liberal contributor and also 
gave many books, maps and papers for the society. 

When the question came up of asking aid of the United 

*,T. H. U. Studies, 9: 500. 

fin 1821 Dr. Ely Ayres, agent for the society, was sent out in a 
United Stotes vessel under Lieutenant Stockton. Ayres and Stock- 
ton bought of King Peter, King George, King Zoda, King Long Peter, 
King Governor and King Jimmy, for ?300, a tract of land for the 
colony. A. C. S. Rei>orts, 7, 79, 1824. 

tTable of Recaptured Africans. &c.. Washington, 1845. 

gChristian Examiner, 1824. pp. 83. 467. 

IJChristian Examiner, 1824, p. 322. 



38 Robert Qoodloe Harper. 

States Government for the society, General Harper warmly 
supported the claim the society had upon the Government. 
No private means, he said, could carry out the scheme of the 
society. All they could do was to pave the way. It had 
been shown to be practicable to colonize the free blacks. 
But private efforts could at most reach only a few thousand 
of them. The task needed a far mightier hand, and it must 
have three indispensable features; it must be gradual, volun- 
tary and with consent of the slave owners. Such a task rcr 
quired national means. The object was national in its con- 
sequences. The nation must remove the national evil. "We 
may appeal to the patriotism and good sense of Congress," 
he said, *'in this great national undertaking."* 

When the society met, February, 1824, General Harper 
proposed a name for the African colony — Liberia. "A name 
that is peculiar, short and familiar and that expresses the 
object and nature of the establishment in Liberia, which 
denotes a settlement of people made free. This name is easy, 
apt and concise." The name was adopted. Then General 
Harper proposed to call the capital "Monrovia," "as a mark 
of gratitude to that venerable man to whom it owes more 
than to any other single man, it being perfectly well known 
that but for the favorable use of the great powers confided 
to him all our efforts must have been unavailing,"! The 
town, now Cape Palmas, the home of the Kroomen,| was 
named Harper by the society for the man who named the 
country and the capital. § 

In twenty years the society sent out more than four thou- 
sand negroes. Of these sixteen hundred were from Virginia 
and seven hundred and seventy-five from North Carolina. 

In 1896 emigration, which had been checked by the Civil 
War, began to revive, and three hundred and twenty-five 
went on their own charges.|| Since 1822 the total number of 
emigrants sent to Liberia is 18,000. Liberia has never really 
been a part of Africa; it has been more a part of Virginia or 
North Carolina, stuck on to the African coast. American 
ideas and sentiments prevail to the total exclusion of social 
aspirations. Yet the Americo-Liberians, as they prefer to 
be called, have done a great work for Africa. 

The emigrants and their descendants number only about 

♦Lincoln, December 1, 1862, favored colonieatioa of free negroes 
outside the United States. Selox. 1: 5. 

tJ. H. U. Studies, p. 511; A. C. S. Reports, 7: 5. 

tFred Douglass in Johnson's Encyclopedia. 

§J. H. U. Studies, 9: 511. 

II Liberia, Bulletin of A. C. S.,. February, 1897, p. 4. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 39 

20,000, but their sphere of inliuence extends over thousands 
of natives. They have demonstrated the capacity of the 
negro for self-government, if given the proper environment.* 

Liberia has four counties, Mesurado, Grand Basso, Senoie, 
and Maryland in Liberia; Louisiana, New Georgia, Virginia, 
Greenville and Lexington. There is no national debt, a sur- 
plus in the treasury, a property qualification for the suffrage, 
a regular school system and churches of various denomina- 
tions. 

The exhibit from Liberia at the World's Fair was very 
creditable. The direct trade of Liberia with the United 
States is not large, but the use of American goods bought 
in Europe is considerable. 

To all the results of the scheme of colonization General 
Harper contributed more or less. In particular his part in 
the work may be briefly capitulated, thus: 

1. He was one of the early members of the society. 

2. His able defense of the society at a critical moment 
turned the trend of opinion to an interest in the plan. 

3. He was for years a vice-president of the society. 

4. He was Vice-President of the Maryland Auxiliary So- 
ciety. 

5. He gave the names Liberia and Monrovia to the land 
and its capital. 

6. His own name has been given to the town of Harper.f 
Of General Harper as a lawyer we have had little to say. 

The aim and the limits of this paper preclude an account of 
that side of his activity. His practice was large, important 
and lucrative. Mention of a few cases will illustrate his 

♦Fred Douglass in Johnson's Encyclopedia. 

tThe American Colonization Society still exists. It has accom- 
plished these results: 

1. It established a colony, which exists to-day as an independent 
nation. 

2. It has given aid to emigrants. 

3. It has diffused knowledge of Africa and of the free blacks of 
the United States. 

4. It has aroused sympathy for the negro race in the United States 
and in Africa. 

5. It cheeked the slave trade. 

6. It has aided in the civilization and Christianizarion of Africa. 

7. It made an honest effort to cure our country's evils. 

8. It may yet furnish the solutio^ for the greatest problem which 
confronts our people. 

Captain Cameron. R. N., has said, "Afi'ica is the hope of the future 
and will be the salvation of an over-crowded world." (A. C. S. Re- 
ports, 1897, page SO.) 



40 Robert Goodloe Harper. 

line of work. In 1809-1810 he was engaged with John 
Quincy Adams on the case of Fletcher vs. Peck, before the 
Supreme Court of the United States. In the Pennsylvania 
Supreme Court he was associated with Tilgman, Rawle and 
Lewis, in the case of Commonwealth vs. Cobbett, in 1798. 
In the Maryland courts the records and reports show that he 
took part in 1803 in the case of Owings vs. Smith with Lu- 
ther Martin, the "Bulldog," as his opponent, and the next 
year he was with Martin against IngersoU and Lincoln and 
Dallas in the case of Pennington vs. Coxe. This list might 
be greatly extended. The part Harper played in impeach- 
ment trials has been referred to above. 

In 1824 General Harper determined to retire from profes- 
sional life, and devote himself to public concerns. The 
broad and liberal principles he espoused were set forth in 
an address at the time he announced himself for Congress. 
In the midst of these plans sudden death came.* General 
Harper died January 14, 1825. f His funeral ceremonies were 
most elaborate,! and testified to the universal esteem in 
which he was held in his own city.§ 

General Harper's death called forth many warm tributes 
of respect. The American Colonization Society spoke of him 
as "a friend whose splendid talents commanded the respect 
of the loftiest, whose warm, practical and eflScient benevo- 

*Niles' Register, January 22, 1825, p. 986. 

tSee account of his sudden death in J. P. Kennedy, "Life of Will- 
lam Wirt, 2, 169, where is quoted a letter of Wirt's, January 16, 
1825. 

t Baltimore American, January 17, 1825. 

§A full account of it may be seen in a rare old book by Jos. Picker- 
ing, "An Emigrant's Guide to Canada." My thanks are due to Mr. 
Bump of the Baltimore Sun for the use of this book. 
♦-'General Harper was interred at his county estate "Oakland." His 
remains were later removed to Greenmount Cemetery in Baltimore. 
The monument there bears the epitaph: 

ROBERT GOODLOE HARPER. 

Born near Fredericksburg, Virginia. A member of the Legisla- 
ture of South Carolina. Then a Representative of that State in Con- 
gress. Then chosen to the Senate of Maryland. And then a Sena- 
tor from Maryland in the Senate of the United States. As a states- 
man he was distinguished by extended knowledge, accurate judg- 
ment, energy of character, and imbending integrity. As a lawyer 
he occupied an exalted station at the Bar of Maryland. As husband, 
father and friend he possessed and exercised all the warm and noble 
feelings of the human heart. He died at Baltimore, January 14, 
1825, in the sixty-first year of his age. "Vir cui ad summam aucto- 
ritatem niliil del'uit praeter sanam civium menreni." Tir. Liv. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 41 

lence, the affection of the purest minds."* The most elab- 
orate and eloquent tribute was pronounced by William 
Wirt, who said: ''He has been for thirty years on the great 
theater of the United States and in the eyes of the nation; 
* * * the nation has considered him as one of her bright- 
est ornaments. We are proud to acknowledge him as stand- 
ing in the van of our ranks, who would have thrown an 
illustrious light upon the profession in any country."! John 
Neal in Blackwood's Magazine said of Harper: "We hold 
him to be altogether one of the ablest men North America 
has produced. "t 

*A. C. S., Reports, 8:4, 19. Missionary Herald, vol. 21, April, 1825. 
fNiles' Register, January 22, 1825, p. 986. 
$Vol. 17, p. 56. 



42 Rohcrt Goodloe Harper. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY. " 

Harper's autobiography and correspondence; wills, deeds and 
genealogy; Harper's Select Works, 2 vols., 1814; his pamphlets and 
addresses. 

Annals and Journals of Congress; Reports of the American Col- 
onization Society; Court Records of Trials; Proceedings of the Mary- 
land Legislature. 

Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, Burr, Finley and Taney. 

Nile's Register, Porcupine's Works, Baltimore American, Chris- 
tian Examiner, 1824; Missionary Herald, 1825; North American Re- 
view, 1824; Blackwood's Magazine, 1825; Red Book, 1818-1819; 
Biographies of Jared Sparks, Justice Story, Jno. Jay, Charles Can-oil, 
of Carrollton, Fisher Ames, William Wirt, Andrew Jackson, Jeffer- 
son, etc. 

Wharton, State Trials of the United States; Foster, Commentaries 
on the Constitution; Johns Hopkins University Studies; Scharf, His- 
tories of Baltimore City and County; and of Maryland. 

Latrobe's Addresses; Gibbs' Administrations of Washington and 
Adams; Pickering, Emigrants' Guide to Canada; Poore, Congres- 
sional Directory; Alexander, Princeton Catalogue; Publication of the 
Massachusetts and the Maryland Historical Societies; Lundy's 
Genius of Universal Emancipation; Jefferson's Notes on Virginia; 
Levasseur's Lafayette; Works of Hamilton, Madison, and Washing- 
ton; Griffith's Annals of Baltimore; Robert Walsh's Appeal from the 
Judgment of Great Britain, and his sketch of Harper in Francis 
Leiber's Encyclopedia Americana; Riots in Baltimore, Federal Ga- 
zette and standard histories. 



Robert Goodloe Harper. 43 



LIFE. 

Charles William Sommerville was born at Wtiite Post, Clarke Co., 
Va., in 1867, and was prepared for college chiefly by his sisters. He 
entered Hampden-Sidney College in 1887, and was graduated A. B. 
with Second Honor, and the Latin Salutatory, and B. Sc. in 1890. In 
1895 he received the diploma of Union Theological Seminary (Vir- 
ginia), and in 1896 the degree of A. M. from Hampden-Sidney Col- 
lege, where, 1891-96, he was Assistant Professor of Latiu and Ger- 
man. In 1896 he entered the Johns Hopkins University, was ap- 
pointed to an Honorary Scholarship, and for three years followed 
courses in History, Political Philosophy, the History of Philosophy, 
and Economics. 



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